Thursday, 09 June 2011

What would your thoughts be if your scallywag middle child woke you up in the morning asking for the dustpan and brush?

With any experience of my particualr scallywag you'd most likely wake right up and ask more clearly than you felt: what for?

To which the scallywag would state that she didn't want long hair any more and was also Doing Some Craft.

Cue waking right up enough to turn the light on to inspect the damage.

We got off lightly.

I've seen fringes (er, my own) much worse than this.

Just some chunks off the side and out of the back.

But quite determined she did not want the planned-on talked-about Rapunzel locks any more.

And so, the second 'can you fix this?' visit to the hairdressers for this family in two weeks (er, earlier one may have been to fix a dreadful fringe cut I gave myself. I know. It's genetic. That's enough out of you.)

Life with this smallie is a ride, that's for sure. She lives right at the very edges of her skin and pushes me to mine. Crazy as a coconut. Takes after her father.

I think it suits her.

Ever cut your own hair? Got a head shaving story from uni? (I do.) A dreadful habit of snipping split ends? It's not really just me is it?

Sunday, 05 June 2011

Hope you've had/are having a lovely Sunday and haven't lost any children.

Oh wait. That was me.

We had skip around the sustainability expo in Kiama today, at which both children managed to let go of helium balloons, one inside, not so bad, one outside, just as Adam and I were going into raptures over the amazing community garden on display. All those lost balloons, all that stretchy plasticky stuff ending up in the oceans. We are bad greenies. Forget the fact Tilly did an accidental stage dive off a wonderful permaculture swale and hit a sharp stick which took a bite out of her wee face right under her eye. More worried about the balloon and the sea life.

But I didn't lose her at the sustainability expo.

No, it was at home. Later. About fifteen minutes before her friend Katie's dad was due to come pick her up for a play. I hadn't seen her for five or ten minutes and I knew she was outside. I usually stand on the verandah and call. Sometimes I ring the bell we've got for this reason, they can usually hear it wherever they are and come back.

Not today.

Henry said: I think she's gone to Katie's.

I said: Of course she hasn't.

But she had. She'd picked up her backpack and walked out the front gate and down the hill to Katie's house. I learnt this as Katie's dad Matthew drove in with Katie's brother and the other small neighbourhood boys to collect Henry to go and see some model trains, and he said he'd passed her walking up their driveway.

To be honest, it's not across town. It's about half a kilometre down our country lane.

But still. Who would've thought. All by herself.

Adam had ducked out to a beekeeping seminar so I couldn't have a parenting 101 consult which he's so good at.

So Matthew took Henry off and I packed Ivy into the backpack and walked down there myself. And had stern words. And made her promise never to do it again. Told her, to her surprise, it was dangerous, it's a road, she's four years old.

And I left it at that.

I didn't drag her home. I didn't make a big fuss. I told her if she did it again she would not be allowed to play with Katie, and that's a pretty serious deterrent. (I hope.) And this little girl of mine is so headstrong, I don't think heavy-handed authority is a sustainable approach.

Her confidence is so foreign to me. I would never have had to guts to do something like that at four.

She said she knew she was going to Katie's, she just thought she'd save Matthew the trouble of the pick-up.

It was quite logical.

I'd never told her not to walk to Katie's house.

Far out, what else have I not spelt out that would never occur to me she might attempt?

Thursday, 02 June 2011

~ Sitting and staring at the wonderful ginger-like in-season Jerusalem artichokes and wondering what the heck to do with them.

Cook 'em, I think babe. (I can't believe she's almost ONE. If I didn't have this year recorded here I might start to think I'd missed it.)

~ Mixing buttermilk and cream and leaving it on the bench for a day to get gorgeous, glossy sour cream. (More on home made sour cream next week!)

~ Finding shovels and holes all over the garden.

Occasionally with a culprit or two (or four - we love the neighbours) attached.

Digging for treasure, apparently.

This hole, below, had a map strewn on the ground next to it. I'm not kidding. This is completely unguided by me, although am all for them digging up priceless pirate treasure. Knock yourselves out, smallies.

Map by Tilly.

~ Experiencing free-range baby. And trying to find the balance between letting her feel the ground and needing to carry her around so I know where she is.

~ Ending each day with a couple of chapters of classic Enid Blyton.

Ivy's not as riveted as the other two but she's still young. There's time to thoroughly inculcate her with Enid Blyton yet.

Hope your Thursday had some buried treasure.

xxx

I try to remember when time's measurepainfully chafes, for instance when autumn

flares out at the last, boisterous and like us longingto stay - - - how everything lives, shifting

from one bright vision to another, foreverin these momentary pastures.

Friday, 06 May 2011

I'm ashamed to say there's raised voices (usually mine: WILL YOU GET IN THE CAR.)

There's no enjoying the moment. There's no perfect pastoral family scene. There can even be moments when I think bitterly, this sucks. Enough to forget all the good stuff, and to think about what's not happening, the places I'm not wandering, the calm I'm not feeling, the life I'm not living.

I rush into my bedroom to spend the precious half an hour left of Ivy's daytime nap attempting to sort out my out-of-control wardrobe and I find this:

Still in her ballet class stuff, with my iphone and Adam's headphones, listening to the Beauty and the Beast soundtrack.

And sometimes she looks so like me when I was little it gives me a pang, and reminds me to think little.

Stop the rush.

Drop everything and listen to some favourite music.

Wear a leotard.

Oh and legwarmers.

Thinking little. Where your biggest worries are whether Mum remembered to buy the green food colouring to make "Tinkerbell Magic Meringues" and whether the white goose will chase you when you're trying to get into the car but it's between you and the car and you'd rather take on Mum yelling than the damn goose.

Thursday, 28 April 2011

Brothers and sisters. I love mine. Adore them, actually. I know I'm lucky. I love them because they're awesome and not nut cases.

My Mum loves her sister and brother. As a kid I used to adore it when they got together, particularly Mum and her sister, they would laugh and laugh and laugh until they were just laughing at themselves laughing.

My Dad too. His sister, my aunt, has one of the warmest hugs in the world. And Dad's brother was a very beloved man who left a big gap when he died suddenly fifteen years ago. I remember when I was younger, watching Dougie, my uncle, drive into the dairy. I was about fourteen and I noticed how happy Dad was to see him. I realised they were friends. They stood by Dougie's ute and chatted for about twenty minutes.

You can't make your children be friends. We can just throw them together as often as possible and hope they form bonds independent of us.

I'm so totally blessed to be surrounded by people with heartfelt sibling relationships, it's probably a good model for the smallies. There's no one like a sister to tell it how it is, keep you in line and be the first person you feel like calling in a crisis. Or on a good day. Or with news. Or to tell them about the goat's cheese you're eating right this moment.

I hope you have a brother or a sister. And that you like them.

It's what we hope for as parents, I think: without us, they'll be pals.

And they won't tear each other to shreds the moment we're not looking.

Tuesday, 19 April 2011

We got in the car yesterday, and drove for eight hours, and here we are on holidays.

We're so incredibly lucky the kids travel peacefully and happily without exception (OK, one "I'm BORED") from the four year old which was assuaged by a square of chocolate and the old portable DVD player strung up between the headrests.

Comes from locking them in the car for long stretches between Brisbane and Sydney at a young impressionable age I think.

So I'm just going to post the odd postcard here this week. I love a long car trip with Adam, he has nowhere to go and I can talk unhindered to him for ages. Awesome.

More than that, I love being away with this little Walmsley crew. Out of the routine, change of scene. All fun.

Hope your week is shaping up well, and if you're in school holidays where you are too, that you're having a break or at least the juggle of childcare and work isn't anxiety-producing.

Friday, 25 March 2011

1. The grass isn't always greener. Sometimes I wish I was someone else, or something other, or part of the gang, or perhaps better at self promotion. And then I take a good hard look at the absolute blessings around me and I think: bugger the big picture. This, right now, is wonderful.

2. If you leave the TV off, you might just come around a corner one day and find something truly amazing.

3. Sometimes time stands still.

4. In flooding rains there'll be casualties. For me it was most of my basil crop. These four are the last standing from what was this:

But the fittest that survive tend to go a bit nuts with relief:

(Forecast: we are going to have cucumbers coming out our ears shortly. Should be attractive.)

5. I am so not ready for her to walk. So not ready.

6. Sometimes an after dinner walk is exactly what everyone needs...

... the best kind of therapy. (It's just a car. It's just money. We'll forget about all that but we'll remember these hills, that glorious light, hanging out together laughing.)

Thursday, 24 March 2011

If you follow along on Facebook you would have gathered I had a bit of a drama on Saturday which started with me driving home in the torrential rain and fog from a blogging conference to being rescued from a flooding river.

Here's what happened.

The conference was interesting. I met some awesome bloggers. It wasn't entirely what I expected but I learnt some stuff and it was amazing seeing how enormous the Mum/personal/lifestyle blogging space is in Australia. It's big.

I had dinner in the city with my dearest pal Ness and then high tailed it home to my baby (mostly the eight month old.)

It was teeming with rain. The whole way.

When I eventually got the the end of our little lane it was after 11pm. There seemed to be water across the road, quite a lot of it. So I rang Adam, up waiting for me, and he said to keep him on speaker and just drive slowly and steadily, it'd be fine.

Wasn't.

The car conked out in the middle of the water. It was a lot deeper than it had looked in the dark in my headlights. The electrics all went out and right before they did I got a flash on the dashboard which said that the automatic door locking had been activated.

I don't usually panic. I think I'm generally pretty good in a crisis. But it was pitch dark, the water was up to the car door, I could feel the car rocking and I realised I had made a very very bad call. This was how dreadful accidents happen. You're close to home, you think you'll just drive over the water. And then there's water in the engine and you've got nowhere to go.

I picked the phone up off my lap and said in tones of rising panic, I'm not ashamed to admit, that the car was dead. Adam said to try it again. Truly dead. He asked whether I could open the door and I replied I wasn't prepared to as I could hear all the rushing water and it looked deep.

He said he'd be there in a tick.

Poor man. I suspect he was a tad worried. He was in such a hurry he didn't even go to the neighbours to ask them to watch the kids, he threw all three of them into the car, in the pouring rain, and drove down the hill.

This probably only took five minutes. After two minutes in the car, which felt like twenty, I called my Dad.

Again, I tried to stay calm. Dad asked questions and I answered, no idea what we said, 'cept I got the message he was coming over too. Which is what I wanted to hear. He's your man in a crisis, my Dad, and I knew he'd bring a farm car that could tow, and a rope.

Meanwhile, Adam arrives and leaves his headlights on so I can see what's happening. He wades through the water towards me without hesitation. He opens my car door and takes my arm.

"Nice evening for it, babe," he says cheerily.

I'm a bit shaky and he leads me through the water, up past our knees, back up to our other car.

I wait there with the kids who think it's one big hilarious adventure to be out in the middle of the night in the pouring rain. Adam goes back to the car, Dad arrives and they tow it out. Marvellous, marvellous men.

When we eventually get home and start peeling off all the wet clothes, Dad, as he's leaving, suggests we call the insurer in the morning.

Which would be fine except we had owned this car, our second car, for exactly eight days and I hadn't got around to getting it insured.

AND I had been wearing my all time favourite red boots.

I hadn't even thought of taking them off. In fact, I'd left my camera in the car. Dad collected it for me and I found it on Sunday morning, unharmed. Dry, even.

The smash repairs place have suggested the car is a write-off. We think it might be worth investigating replacing the engine. The discussions go on.

I'm just super grateful no one was hurt.

Except my boots.

But they're drying out.

xxx

P.S. If you're not in the habit of reading comments, can I just say, have a look at the comments on the last post. The 'bravest thing' stories from you lot are ASTOUNDING. You are amazing and wonderful folk.

Tuesday, 15 March 2011

Maybe when I got back into the car today to run an errand, wondered what the funny smell was, realized it was all my groceries, sitting in the car for how long? Maybe two hours? I'd carried the baby inside, asleep, and got busy doing other things. Excellent. Not many dairy products in those bags at all.

Was it yesterday morning, when I was madly flinging through the clothes mountain (my friend Catriona's term) looking for a clean school uniform. Swearing to myself. Because it was only school photo day. And I didn't appear to have any clean shirts for the boy. (Found one. Lucky.)

Or, also yesterday, catching up with an old school friend and I realised I had not even looked in a mirror before leaving the house. I don't mean this figuratively in any way. And I'm not kidding. Didn't even look. I might have had fungus on an eyebrow for all I knew.

Is it when you open the door of the washing machine and almost trip over backwards. Stinkarooney, says Tilly. Well that's where all the damn school shirts are then.

Is it forgetting to take the bin out, and getting that massive rush of dread, particularly when they're only collected fortnightly, can I make it? Rushing down the drive dragging a big green sulo with one arm, holding a baby with the other, trying not to tip it over on the cattle grid. Looking down in horror realising there's a good chance I might not even be dressed. Undies on. That'll do.

I learnt today, as a lovely friend shared her story of discovering a liquified sushi roll in her handbag, that wheel-falling-off stories are better shared.

Skidding on the recycling spilling out all over the kitchen floor isn't at all funny on my own. Sharing it with you is.

Please join in.

(Unless everything runs perfectly at your place, in which case what the heck are you doing reading this blog?)